transfiguration Year C

Exodus 34: 29-35 NRSV text
Psalm 99 NRSV text
2 Corinthians 3: 12-4:2 NRSV text
Luke 9: 28-36 NRSV text

It isn’t difficult to see the connections between this week’s Lectionary texts, is it? Mountain-top revelations of God, shining faces, “glory”, seeing but not understanding – they’re all here. And for all the emphasis on “seeing” in these texts, we also have the divine voice from the cloud: “This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!” We’ve heard the voice before, at Jesus’ baptism (3:22); then, it was for the benefit of Jesus. Here, the voice is for the benefit of the disciples. It’s an answer to the question first raised by Herod in 9:9: “Who is this about whom I hear such things?” We’ve been positively inundated with sense-data since then: the feeding of the Five Thousand, Peter’s declaration about Jesus, the first of the passion predictions, and now the Transfiguration. And the voice, literally, “says it all”!

The crucial (literally!) moment in the story …
“Crucial” derives from the word “crux”, meaning “cross”. This is the mid-point of Luke’s narrative. In 9:51, Jesus “sets his face to go to Jerusalem”. As Luke has it, “the days for him to be taken up” (a reference to suffering and death) have “drawn near”. The entire second half of the gospel is set within the narrative framework of the Lukan Travel Narrative – the journey up to Jerusalem. This is a narrative device which functions as the means for Jesus’ teaching about true discipleship. The true disciple is the one who follows Jesus – not only in the sense of trailing around after him, but in sharing his purpose, his priorities, and, ultimately, his fate. Although we are only half way through the gospel, Luke tells the story as though the Passion was due any minute now. What is going on here?

The first half of the gospel is the story of Jesus’ mission and proclamation of the Kingdom of God. The disciples have been with Jesus. They have seen and shared what he has been doing; they have heard what he has been saying. It’s high octane, heady stuff! It has become clear to them that they have thrown their lot in with a very special person indeed. This is no “ordinary” prophet (not that prophets were “ordinary” – it’s just that Jesus was clearly in a league of his own, even among those in this category!). No one has been able to do what Jesus does, and simply in the power of his own authority. He heals. He casts out demons. And he teaches. He takes on the religious leaders and teachers, presenting a very different picture of God. His actions are a demonstration that God is evidently “with” him. Jesus seems to have a hotline directly to God.

There’s something so clearly extraordinary about Jesus that everyone is wondering who the heck he really is – including Herod! In trying to answer that for themselves, the disciples find themselves constantly having to reach beyond the more obvious categories. The suspicion has been dawning on them that Jesus doesn’t represent just a stage in God’s dealings with the world, but must actually represent the final stage. Hence Peter’s conclusion in 8:20 (which we should probably read as Peter grappling with a realisation that is only just beginning to dawn): “You are the Messiah of God!”

There is a problem. This is not a story that is going to end happily ever after. Jesus is only too keenly aware of two things: the first is the mounting opposition that he is experiencing, which has its epicentre in Jerusalem; the second is that he knows that it is his reception in Jerusalem that counts in the end. Jesus is not just going around doing nice things and making a lot of poor, unhappy and marginalised people feel good: he is engaged in a confrontation over the very identity and character of God. He knows that his real opponent is the Temple system in Jerusalem, which regulates the life and fabric of his society’s universe. Hence his response to Peter is immediately to try and impress upon them that being the Messiah his way is about a confrontation that he actually has no chance of winning. And he realises that asking them to follow him is a bit like the recruiters for various dissident groups that were prepared to take on the might of Rome in an uprising that meant virtually certain death: “Come! Deny yourselves! Take up your cross and follow me!” (cf his statement in 9:23, which probably deliberately echoed this sort of recruiting slogan).

The dark clouds of the Passion are beginning to mass. The gospel’s “weather” has changed. The earlier optimism which we readers felt is beginning to chill around the edges. And here, on the mountain, Jesus, Moses and Elijah are speaking about “the departure that he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem”. The point, therefore, is that this is the moment in the gospel when the inevitability of disaster is confirmed. Now there is a great deal going on here about continuity with the Law and the Prophets – but this isn’t the moment to discuss that. I want only to note here the significance of the subject matter of the conversation on the mountain for Luke’s narrative. It’s a headline moment – “The cross is confirmed! It’s a goer!” That changes things dramatically. There isn’t any more open-endedness about this story – however much we and the disciples might continue to look for it. It changes Jesus’ mission, too: the liberative mission has been transformed into the Way of the Cross. It is the encounter between Jesus, Moses and Elijah – this confirmation – that is the basis for Luke 9:51: something has changed, and Jesus’ days are numbered.

Fairly amazing news for the disciples!
What do Peter, James and John get out of this incident? They are party to an epiphany – a moment of divine revelation. There are some familiar Lukan elements to the story which set the scene: Jesus has withdrawn to a mountain to pray. These times of prayer – of deep communion with God – are where Jesus draws his energy and guidance. They are private moments. The disciples are not part of these encounters. Ordinarily, they are absent; here, as will happen in Gethsemane, they are “weighed down with sleep” (v32). Prayer for Jesus is refreshment – but it’s hard work. It’s “heavy stuff” – and the disciples can’t cope with the weight.

This time, however, they manage to stay awake long enough to see something that must have been tempting to dismiss as a dream: the transfiguration of Jesus. Jesus’ changed face and dazzling white clothing are standard biblical motifs of divine presence. These are “glory moments” – the uncovering of God’s hidden ness.

The parallel here with Exodus 34: 29-35 is obvious and deliberate. Moses is present, on a mountain. What the incident in Exodus does, among other things, is to confirm Moses’ authority as speaking for Yahweh, and set him apart from the rest of the Israelites. Moses is the means by which Yahweh will communicate to the people. They are to listen to him – as the divine voice commands the disciples to do to Jesus. At the same time, the disciples are to understand that “someone greater than Moses” is here. Moses and Elijah represent the Law and the Prophets respectively. They represent in their own persons Yahweh’s revelation – Yahweh’s self-communication. Whereas Moses’ shining was a reflection of Yahweh’s glory, Jesus’ face, by contrast, is the revelation of his own glory. By implication, it is the divine glory that Moses encountered on the mountain.

Light becomes darkness as a cloud overshadows them – just as it will do on Golgotha. Whereas Luke’s narrative has been peppered with references to sight, that sense has now been eclipsed. There is nothing to be seen: the disciples can only listen. And what they hear is the voice of God – the voice that has spoken through the angels and at Jesus’ baptism. And as we have learned to expect, it speaks to confirm Jesus’ divine identity.

The struggle of the disciples to “get it” (cf 2 Corinthians 3: 12-4:2)
Part of Luke’s point is that this is startling news to the disciples! He’s trying to tell us that, to date, however close they’ve got to the truth, they just don’t realise how “big” the truth is! Their imaginative capacities are too small. They’re still thinking far too narrowly: when Peter says Jesus is the Messiah, he’s right about the implication that Jesus is the fulfilment of the Old Covenant promises. Yet Jesus is far more than that. That’s the first thing they clearly fail to understand. Peter responds to the transfiguration in v33 by calling Jesus “Master”. That’s a strikingly disappointing assessment of the person he’s talking to! It doesn’t even rate on the same plain as “Messiah”! “Master” is an acknowledgement that Jesus is the leader of this particular discipleship band. But it’s a dead giveaway in terms of Peter’s inability to begin to comprehend the implications of what he has seen.

The theme of “seeing but not perceiving; hearing but not understanding” is prominent. All that the disciples have seen and heard cannot make clear to them what is actually going on in Jesus, because they simply do not have the wherewithal – imaginatively, conceptually, theologically or religiously – to “get it”! That is why the divine voice is necessary. Revelation is not just a matter of God becoming visible: the meaning of what can be seen requires explanation. It is, if you like, a moment of both Word and Sacrament!

Remember that Luke emphasises the extent to which Jesus is ambiguous in terms of the Old Covenant vs the New Covenant. We mustn’t underplay the sense in which Jesus’ message is “You ain’t understood God properly at all! You’re missing the point!” So much about Jesus appears to run counter to what was known and believed about Yahweh. Yet ironically, despite the fact that Jesus seems to be in a minority of one in his theology (understanding of God), he’s actually right … because he is none other than God’s Son, the Chosen one! That is why the disciples are to listen to him – and particularly when Jesus talks about the way of the cross! They’ll need to remember that God has told them it’s okay to take Jesus’ word for it – because the Way of the Cross will appear to deny and run counter to everything that they know or might expect of God and God’s Chosen Messiah!

The presenting problem for Luke is why the Jews and Christians read the same scriptures (the Law and the Prophets) but come to radically different and conflicting conclusions about who Jesus is and therefore about the character, intentions and actions of God. It’s a problem Paul shares, and reflects on in this second letter to the Corinthian church.

I don’t want to go deeply into the detail of what Paul is arguing here, because the clear intention of the Lectionary compilers is that we read this in the light of the gospel reading for today and in the light of Exodus 34: 29-35. The main point is clear: Paul is wondering how it is that the Jewish readers of the Old Covenant cannot “see” the point about Jesus. His conclusion is that they are deliberately shut off to its possibility. They have hardened themselves – they resist the Christian reading because to do so would require nothing less than a revolution in their whole understanding of who God is. This, of course, mirrors Paul’s own personal experience. He could not believe that a crucified Jesus could possibly be God’s Messiah. The cross proved conclusively that Jesus was not God’s Son, the Chosen. The cross proved that we ought not to listen to Jesus’ lies about God! And then, in another moment of blinding light –glory – Paul asks the identity of the divine caller of his name, and is told, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting!” It’s an epiphany – but here on the Damascus Road, it’s an “Oh s**t!” moment. His world falls apart. The veil falls from his face and he “sees” clearly (ironically, precisely at the moment when he is blinded!).

Paul uses a midrash on Exodus 34: 29-35 to explain the Jewish blindness to Jesus and the Old Covenant. Just as the Israelites were not prepared to look on Moses’ shining face – the reflection of God’s glory – so Paul’s own people are not prepared to look at Jesus and see God’s glory. Because Jesus is the revelation – the unveiling of God – and will not be covered, the people choose to veil themselves in order not to be confronted with God in Jesus Christ. It’s too unpalatable!

People are rightly uncomfortable with this passage because of the ways in which it has been seized on by anti-Semitic Christians who label Jews as Christ-killers in order to justify persecuting them. Paul, however, is not being anti-Semitic. What we see here are three things: the first is his own agony at the failure of the covenant people to embrace God’s Messiah when he came to them. It’s the same agony that leads him to pen Romans 9-11, asking what this means for the status of the covenant and the fate of the people in the hands of a God whom they have rejected so decisively. Secondly, it reflects Paul’s awareness of the enormous difficulty of thinking outside the box – of being genuinely open to something radically new from God. Paul is aware of the ways in which we are prisoners of our own best theological systems, inoculated against the sort of radical grace that God demonstrates in Jesus. This sort of blindness is only overcome with enormous effort and difficulty – on God’s part, too! And thirdly, Paul is only too well aware of how deeply human resistance to God can be entrenched. The story of the human rejection of God begins in the story of the Garden, and reaches its zenith in the wilful killing of Jesus. Paul knows how much is at stake for people who have everything invested in the way things are – and the way God is supposed to be! He would understand only too well, for instance, that world poverty is a failure of minimal generosity and self-sacrifice, rather than economic impossibilities. He would understand the current wranglings and difficulties that the politicians are having about reducing carbon emissions – not because it’s impossible, but because it’s too economically and politically expensive. He recognises what deliberate veiling is – the fact that human beings tragically and deliberately choose self-destruction rather than God and God’s ways.

What’s in it for Jesus?
And what about Jesus? Is there anything important for the transfiguration for him, or is it all for the disciples’ benefit? In other words, I find myself wondering, “What were they (Jesus, Moses and Elijah) actually saying?” Of course, this is inevitably speculative. Nevertheless, I found myself reflecting as follows.

It seems to me that Moses and Elijah are sent to encourage Jesus and strengthen his nerve. Divine confirmation of his identity and mission come at crucial points – and when he most needs them. And here, the subject is the forthcoming passion. Just as Luke will tell us that an angel comes to strengthen Jesus in Gethsemane at the moment when he embraces the way ahead, so it seems that Moses and Elijah are here for some moral and pastoral support!

That’s less absurd than it may sound. It depends on how truly human you think Jesus is. Of course, if he’s some sort of god whose humanity is mere appearance (as we often seem to imagine him), then what Jesus did and didn’t know about what was to happen, and how he is to face its horror, is pretty unimportant. It would be nice (in many ways) if it were true. However, the gospel writers don’t buy that, and we ought not to either.

We need to try and get some sort of imaginative purchase on just how horrifying and terrifying the prospect of the cross is for Jesus. It’s clear that he is pretty certain of what awaits him in Jerusalem. And anyway, perhaps some of the details are something he’s told by Moses and Elijah!

But what Luke lets us in on is how fragile Jesus’ confidence and hold on his identity and purpose and mission sometimes became under pressure. That’s when he has to take time out to pray. Just try and imagine how difficult it must have been for Jesus to continue living by faith in God as Jesus understood God to be – if he wasn’t inoculated against doubt and despair. Imagine having the whole of the religious establishment out to get you as a heretic – barracking you, briefing behind your back, pulling every trick in the book and every power play to discredit you. Wouldn’t you sometimes agonise that you may just be wrong, and that it is all a ghastly mistake?

Most importantly, what if you (believed that you) understood that God’s Messiah was going to be what people had no chance of expecting – that God’s ways were to be accomplished through failure and ignominy? And what if you were the only one who believed that? Lastly, add to the mix this fact: with a bit of compromise and strategic politicking, you could avoid all the disaster stuff and become the most famous and powerful person in history! How easy would it be always to hang on to your confidence – and moral commitment to avoidable horror?

And if you were determined to go through with it, would you always be able to withstand the whispers about, “How can this be from God? Look at the Law and the Prophets! Are you seriously thinking that it is possible that God would choose this way?”

Here’s the crunch, you see! If Jesus has to rely solely upon his own experience and understanding of God, and fly in the face of all the religious teaching and understanding, it must have been hellishly (literally?) difficult at times to hold on to the conviction that this was God leading and demanding the Way of the Cross. Jesus must have been as aware as Paul and the disciples and everyone else that the notion of the cross as the Way for the Messiah was just patently absurd. Was it some sort of demonic trick, perhaps – another temptation?

Which brings me to Moses and Elijah. They were discussing his forthcoming “departure” in Jerusalem. And they represent the Law and the Prophets. So what if (and I stress this is all “what if”) they were encouraging Jesus? Telling him he was right? And showing him – explaining to him – that not only was he right about what he believed God was leading to him to do, but that this was nothing less than the fulfilment of the Law and the Prophets? After all, remember that it is Luke who tells us the story of Emmaus: Jesus is with two disciples who are devastated because they had hoped he would be the one to redeem Israel, and yet had been crucified. They had been wrong about him all along! The Jesus, “beginning with Moses and all the prophets, interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures” (24:27) – and the content? “It was necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory!” (24:26)

I think Jesus found God surprising and difficult, just like we do – for all his faith and conviction. And I think God encouraged him, because he would have needed it – just like we do. So I like to think that Jesus, in his moment of glory on the mountain, learned from Moses and Elijah what he was later able to pass on to bewildered disciples (including Paul): “Yes, however strange it may seem, God is like that – the same redeeming, self-sacrificial, lovesick saviour that God always has been!”

Amen.